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All answers provided by Markus Diersbock
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Question: |
Google Analytics Site Overlay Not Counting Outbound Links
From: slappymarsden
Date: Thu, 3 Jan 2008 16:02:05 -0800 (PST)
Subject: Tracking exit links and site overlay
I have the new tracking code installed on my website and there is one
particular page that I am very interested in tracking. it has been hit
over 100 times and has many exit link[s] to other sites.
The site overlay shows no clicks on any of these links and I was
wondering if there was a way to tell if I have it set up properly.
It just strikes as being odd that with over 100 hits that the site
overlay shows that none of the exit links have been clicked on.
Any help appreciated.
Thanks
slappy
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Answer:
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The Google Analytics (formally Urchin) Site Overlay isn't really using the word "clicks" in a pure sense. They are actually calculations on serialized Page Views.
Since the Google Analytics code is recording when a page is loaded/viewed, it can conclude that a click was made, but it actually doesn't track the "click" itself. The only way to natively track the outbound click would be if your tracking code were also on the landing page of the external site.
Here's another way to look at how Google reports a click.
If I see you in a store parking lot, and later, see you inside the store, I can assume that you walked through the front door at some point. And to support my assumption, I can ask you where you just came from, and you would say, "The parking lot".
In this case, the door is the "click" from the first "view" to the second "view", and your response is the "referring" location.
Likewise, Google Analytics doesn't record the actual click, but deduces it occurred by the recording of the originating page view, the succeeding page view, and the additional referring information:
PageA.htm Timestamp
PageB.htm Timestamp (and referring url = PageA.htm)
The Overlay, for PageA.htm, shows 1 Click for the PageB.htm link.
You can verify this, by creating a page with 2 identical links to the same landing page, but click on only one of the links -- the overlay will show that BOTH links were clicked.
PageB.htm - Clicks=1
PageB.htm - Clicks=1
It would be more accurate for the Overlay to display:
PageB.htm - Views=1
PageB.htm - Views=1
And in another twist, if the destination url has a different querystring both pages will NOT get the same click total:
PageB.htm?item=1 - Clicks=1
PageB.htm?item=2 - Clicks=0
PageB.htm?item=1 - Clicks=1
PageB.htm?item=1 - Clicks=1
Google Analytics Site Overlay's use of the word "clicks" is misleading, but once you're used to its quirks, the tool is invaluable.
NOTE: The following post details a JavaScript hack to get Google Analytics to record a pseudo outbound page view, but be aware this may fail in a future update to ga.js.
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